Conventional dermatomes are used for cutting skin tissue to obtain transplantable skin grafts. A skin graft is a patch of healthy skin that is harvested from one area of the body of a patient or donor site to cover a damaged or skinless area of the body of a patient. Typically, a dermatome has a front end holding a flat blade to be placed in contact with a tissue surface and a motor to oscillate the blade from side to side to create a slicing action which cuts the tissue as the dermatome is moved along the tissue surface.